Under the Skin - DVD cover

Jonathan Glazer, 2013

Studiocanal

One for those who like their sci-fi spare and strange. Scarlett Johansson plays a lone predatory succubus in a cheap fake fur, leading lads grinningly to their slaughter. The air is thick with sex and violence but we see neither. Glazer layers on the incongruous contrasts: the alien’s daft small talk puncturing long silences, abstract 2001-like graphical sequences amid the grey of Scottish high streets. It’s all as jarring as the strings and synth score. Watching the creature robotically go about her business is mesmerising, but as she tunes into her human senses there’s the feeling that it’s our own species that’s under scrutiny.

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